Staff

Stephanie Cho

Executive Director

Stephanie Cho is the Executive Director for Asian Americans Advancing Justice - Atlanta. She brings over 15 years of experience in labor and community organizing, strategy planning, and fundraising at the local and national level.

Originally born in South Korea, Stephanie grew up in Oregon. After University, she started her career in organizing and movement work. She has been a community organizer, program director for LGBTQ youth programming, director of training for a national fellowship program, a labor organizer, and organizational consultant. Before coming to Advancing Justice, Stephanie was the Los Angeles Director of the Restaurant Opportunities Center (ROC-LA) where she worked to raise industry standards and wages for LA's restaurant workers.

She believes in creating more space for new leadership, developing healthy and sustainable ways of working towards justice for all, and is moved by transnational forms of expressions of solidarity and movement building.

Aisha Yaqoob

Policy Director

Aisha Yaqoob is the Policy Director at Asian Americans Advancing Justice Atlanta. Aisha became familiar with Advancing Justice in 2016 during her work as the founder of the Georgia Muslim Voter Project, an initiative to increase voter registration and turnout in the Muslim community in Georgia. She completed her Masters of Public Administration from the University of Georgia in May 2016 after completing her undergraduate degree in Journalism/Public Relations in 2013. Aisha has worked and volunteered with various Atlanta area nonprofit organizations. She is involved in her local community through various initiatives and has served advisory roles in civic organizations.

Aisha is excited to join Advancing Justice as the new Policy Director and looks forward to defending the rights of Asian Americans at the local, state, and national level. She is passionate about voting rights, access to healthcare and education, and immigration. Aisha believes in upholding the civil rights and civil liberties for all people, especially those whom have been historically underrepresented.

Javeria Jamil

Prior to joining Advancing Justice – Atlanta, Javeria worked as a Government Watchlist Fellow for the Council on Americans Islamic Relations in Washington D.C., where she assisted clients who had been wrongfully places on the U.S. government’s terror watchlist.

Javeria graduated from the George Washington University of Law. During law school, she was an active member of the GW chapter of the Iraqi Refugee Assistance Project, where she led a team of students in helping Afghan and Iraqi interpreters and refugees apply for Special Immigrant Visas in the U.S. Javeria received her B.A. from University of California, Los Angeles in Middle Eastern and North African Studies.

Javeria is admitted to practice in California, Georgia, and Washington D.C.

Phi Nguyen

Litigation Director

Phi Nguyen joined the Advancing Justice-Atlanta team as litigation director in 2017. In this role, Phi focuses on impact litigation in the areas of voter rights, immigrant rights, and anti-discrimination law.

Phi graduated from Georgia State University School of Law in 2006. She practiced as a medical malpractice defense attorney for eight years, during which time she continuously sought opportunities to serve the Atlanta community outside of her legal practice. Phi was introduced to Advancing Justice in 2016 when she partnered with them to lead Vietnamese Voices, a voter registration drive targeting Vietnamese Americans; this became a jumping point for further grassroots efforts to politically mobilize AAPI communities.

Phi draws her passion to protect and promote the civil rights of the AAPI s from her experience of growing up in the South as a progressive Vietnamese American with refugee parents. As litigation director, Phi looks forward to combining her litigation and trial skills with her commitment to advocacy for underrepresented communities.

Amy Willis

Trinh Huynh Legal Fellow

Amy was born in Hong Kong and lived outside of London before moving to the United States a few months shy of 6 years old. They grew up in Louisville, KY and graduated from Butler University in 2008, with degrees in Political Science and Peace and Conflict Studies. Amy lived overseas in the Czech Republic and South Korea for several years before attending law school at Suffolk University in Boston. Amy graduated from there in 2015 and has spent the past two years developing and running a free eviction defense clinic in Fulton County Magistrate Court.

Amy believes in the power of community organizing to create meaningful social change and is looking forward to using the law to support building power in the South.

Janae Bruce

Office Coordinator

Janae Bruce is the Office Coordinator at Asian Americans Advancing Justice - Atlanta.
She grew up in Lithonia, Georgia and attended the University of Georgia before transferring to Ashford University, completing her B.A. in Sociology and her Master’s in Organizational Management with a specialization in Project Management. Prior to working for Advancing Justice, Janae worked for the nonprofit Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University as a Patient Care Coordinator in a surgical oncology department.

Janae was introduced to Advancing Justice when she volunteered with them and the nonprofit, Center for Pan Asian Community Services on a project called Georgia Immigrant Alliance for Civic Empowerment (GIACE). She currently serves as the Project Lead for the University of Georgia’s Alumnae Chapter of Delta Phi Lambda Sorority Incorporated on the GIACE project, where she focuses on increasing voter turnout among communities of color and increasing the number of eligible legal permanent residents applying for U.S. Citizenship through immigration clinics.

She is passionate about access to healthcare and motivating all underrepresented communities to exercise their right to vote because there is power in numbers.

James Woo

Communications and Outreach Associate

James Chan Woo is the Communications and Outreach Associate at Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Atlanta. James obtained his B.A. in International Affairs at the University of Georgia and his Master’s in International Peace Studies from UN Mandated University for Peace. Prior to working for Advancing Justice – Atlanta, James worked for The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Category II organization, Asia-Pacific Centre of Education for International Understanding in Seoul, South Korea. He has also spent time studying and volunteering abroad in countries including China and Costa Rica. James is committed to building peace from the bottom up and advocating for the rights of all the people.

James enjoys watching movies, listening to alternative music, and enjoys spending time with friends and family. James speaks Korean.

Esther Lim

Program Coordinator

Esther Lim is the Program Coordinator at Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta. She got her start in organizing and advocacy in college as an intern with Advancing Justice-Atlanta. Moved by the potential for change she saw in grassroots activism and civic engagement, she spent her remaining time in undergrad working with movements on campus, focusing primarily on racial and economic justice, immigrant rights, AAPI issues, and LGBTQ rights. Following graduation, she hopped on presidential and down-ballot campaigns in Miami and Philadelphia, after which she worked as a community organizer on the Planned Parenthood Summer of Defiance campaign in Indiana. Having returned to her home turf for her position with Advancing Justice, she is excited to be able to give back to the communities that raised her.

Samantha Keng

Civic Engagement Coordinator

Samantha joined Advancing Justice as the civic engagement coordinator in August 2017. Prior to this, she worked with Advancing Justice as a campus organizer and field intern. She is a fourth-year student at Emory University, where she is double majoring in Gender & Sexuality Studies and History. At Emory, she serves as co-chair of the NAACP Political Action Committee and is a member of a student coalition advocating for sanctuary campus status and protections for undocumented students. Currently, she is collaborating on a zine about radical Chinese American history within the labor, housing rights, and racial justice movements.

She is passionate about Asian American history education and strives to be intentional about mobilizing her Chinese American community to work in solidarity with other folks of color.